Nancy Keesing
Nancy Keesing AM (1923-93) was a Jewish Australian poet, writer, editor and promoter of Australian literature.
Palomino establishes Elizabeth Jolley as absolutely one of the best writers of fiction in this country, although it is a book that in some ways does not, I think, entirely resolve the problems it poses for itself. As I interpret Palomino one of the things Elizabeth Jolley intended to explore in her first novel, is the contrast between a person whose genes, hormones or whatever dictate that they sh ... (read more)
In 1956 my husband and I lived in Perth for some months, and that is when our continuing friendship with Mary Durack; her late husband Horrie Miller, pioneer aviator, and their family, and her artist sister, Elizabeth, began. My friendship with Mary deepened over years, often at Writers’ Weeks in Adelaide, occasionally in Sydney or Perth. The various Duracks I’ve been lucky enough to know are ... (read more)
I occasionally still deliver a lecture I first gave in 1966 though with appropriate variations. One version was published in Quadrant, March-April 1974. There I describe our long tradition of documentary writing or, as H. M. Green called it, “applied writing”.
One of my arguments that I expanded in a series of unpublished lectures was, and is, that from the earliest white settlement to now, w ... (read more)
Thoroughly researched, well ordered, factual biography like Doherty’s Corner appeals to me. If, as is usual with a life-history, there is occasion for reading between the lines, I’m left alone to do it unhampered by authorial speculation. It often happens that when subjects of biographies live into the era of the writer of the book, facts emerge during research that might offend the feelings o ... (read more)
In the world of theatre and concert economics, the inelegant but expressive term, ‘bums on seats’ seems to be here to stay.
The books we buy or borrow (for borrowing patterns affect library sales) are the equivalent of theatre tickets. Books which keep an optimum number of bums on desk or living room chairs are just as good news to publishers and booksellers as prosperous box office returns t ... (read more)
Quarterly magazines have much in common with enjoyable small dinner parties whose hostesses serve fine food and wine in comfortable and attractive surroundings. Confident party-givers need no gimmicks to prompt their guests to lively and civilised conversation; they offer adventurous dishes and a few bottles from newer vineyards, but with respect for a balance with proven favourites [sic]; they in ... (read more)
I am sure A.B. Facey intended no irony in calling his remarkable autobiography A Fortunate Life. He is at once too unassuming and, too serious for smart games with words though he does find humour sometimes among the grim and frightful events of his earlier years and, after his perfect marriage, there were times of fulfilment and true happiness. He has chosen to emphasise triumphs as well as strug ... (read more)
One late afternoon in early summer I went to the launching of Helen Arbib’s Looking at Cooking (Helen Arbib Publications, $3.50, 80 pp) in a beautifully restored and reanimated old house in the Rocks area of Sydney. On the way to Lower Fort Street I’d indulged in one of my favourite meanderings past sentimental landmarks. Among these is a section of Windmill Street, and the Hero of Waterloo Ho ... (read more)
The World of Norman Lindsay is compiled by Lin Bloomfield, proprietor of the Bloomfield Galleries in Paddington, NSW, and an authority on Lindsay’s work. It was first published more expensively in 1979. This elegant paperback will make it widely accessible, which is a matter for satisfaction. It contains comprehensive, short, expert articles about Lindsay’s life and achievements as an artist a ... (read more)
